PANIC STATIONS

Leaked Audio Exposes MAGA Rep’s Poll Nightmare

The lawmaker’s chances of re-election have been severely damaged after the maps were redrawn.

A Texas MAGA Republican told her own supporters she is worried she will lose her re-election bid after seeing the results of an internal poll.

Leaked audio, obtained by Punchbowl News, reveals Rep. Monica De La Cruz expressing concern about her prospects of winning Texas’ 15th Congressional District over Democratic challenger and Tejano music icon Bobby Pulido in the midterms.

De La Cruz said at a private fundraiser last month that her own polling shows she is beating Pulido by only a single point ahead of November’s election.

“And I said, ‘Oh, sweet Lord Jesus, right, that’s not good,’” De La Cruz said.

The two-term GOP congresswoman suggested that the reason her opponent is doing so well is “not that people don’t like me, it’s that people don’t know me yet,” as the 15th District was redrawn under Texas Republicans’ gerrymandering push.

Her district has been redrawn so extensively that her current constituents make up only two-fifths of the new district in which she will compete against Pulido in November.

Pulido, a Latin Grammy Award-winning music star, is hoping to use his name recognition to flip Texas’ 15th District, an area where roughly 75 percent of the population is Latino.

“He’s a Latin Grammy Award winner, his father is a Latin Grammy Award winner, the high school gym at Bella High School is named Bobby Pulido after him and his father,” De La Cruz told supporters at the fundraiser.

“In addition to that, his uncle was a former county judge, and his cousin is a former DA. So they have very deep roots in Hidalgo County. This is a very, very political family, and obviously has musical talent as well.”

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The leaked audio ends with De La Cruz saying that the polling is proof of how “fundraising has become so critical” to boosting her re-election chances.

In response, a spokesperson for De La Cruz’s campaign referenced scandals that threaten to derail Pulidio’s campaign, including touring with a bandmate who is a registered sex offender and making vulgar remarks about women’s bodies in a 2020 podcast.

Campaign manager James Shook told the Daily Beast “There’s no story here.”

“This is a new, conservative district and what that audio leaves out is that Monica is comfortably ahead the moment voters learn basic information about her. Even the polling that the Democrats have released has Monica winning,” he said. “There’s a reason for that: South Texans aren’t sending to Washington a corrupt celebrity who pals around with convicted pedophiles, mocks the genitals of postpartum mothers, and attacks our police officers.”

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De La Cruz is one of multiple Republicans facing difficult midterm races, largely due to backlash against President Donald Trump’s second term.

Democrats are widely expected to regain control of the House, where the GOP currently holds a razor-thin majority.

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